Polytype

noun, verb

noun, verb ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    Any of the types involved in polytypism.

    "Orthochrysotile is a polytype of chrysotile."

  2. 2
    A cast, or facsimile copy, of an engraved block, matter in type, etc.

    "Towards the end of the eighteenth century , Professor Wilson of Glasgow , being engaged in a series of experiments for making etchings upon glass with fluoric acid for the purposes of art , thought it possible to make polytypes of glass from engraved copperplates"

  3. 3
    In the Hindley–Milner type system, a data type containing variables bound by one or more ∀ (for-all) quantifiers.
Verb
  1. 1
    To produce a polytype of. transitive

    "to polytype an engraving"

Example

More examples

"Orthochrysotile is a polytype of chrysotile."

Etymology

From poly- + type.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.